Doctor Josef
Mengele:
The Angel of Death
A Surviving Symbol of Adolf Hiltlers Final Solution

A
lunatic, they screamed, a mad man gone wrong! He is
the almighty devil himself and hes after us ALL
of us!

Those
are the voices of a few of the hundreds of innocents that
suffered through the endless horrors and tortures and were
ultimately murdered at the hands of The Angel of Death.
Who was this unthinkable animal that enjoyed power and notoriety
so lustfully that he was able to slaughter hundreds while
maintaining a sly smile? Doctor Josef Mengele. Motivated by
strong political and family influences, this psychopath performed
malicious experiments and human torture; all the while believing
he was doing the world a favor.

Growing
up in a family with two brothers and workaholic parents, Josef
Mengele had to compete for attention. This boy, born in Germany
on March 16th of 1911, developed a craving to be heard
and for fame at a very young age. His parents were often distant
and cold to him1. Mengeles mother,
Walburga, was known to be warm and maternal, or she could
behave like a raging bull.2 Workers in their
family company feared her terrible temper. To young Mengele, his
mother was incapable of loving.3 However,
he was still a dashing young lad with an exuberant soul and
intelligent mind. He soon found the warmth of a mother in his
nanny, Monika, a devout Catholic who never let Mengele question
the faith; leading him to believe that all non-Catholics were
wrong and evil.

Mengele
grew up in Germany at the time right before and during World War
I. Children, like Mengele, were taught nationalistic ideas
everywhere; in school, church, youth group, family, and the
media. The rulers of the German Empire believed they could be
leaders of the world, viewing nationalism and down with the
Jews and up with the Aryan race as very important issues.
This was what had led them into WWI. Social Darwinism also had a
critical impact on Mengeles childhood: the strong shall
survive, as the weak must perish. An impression of Germans
superiority dominated in every growing childs head.

As
a growing teenager, Mengele proved to be a very exceptional
person. He was often praised by teachers for his self-discipline
and control. He was very charming, confident, and handsome.
Mengeles favorite courses at school included zoology,
physics, and biology. And his favorite subject was anthropology,
the study of humans. Graduating in 1930 and wanting a name for
himself, Mengele strutted away from the family business and
looked into medicine.

After
a few years of hard work and dedication, Josef Mengele was
offered a position as a research assistant with the third Reichs
Institute for Heredity Biology and Race Research, which
specialized in racial studies, in 1937. It was in this institute
that Mengele first met the man that would later change his life,
the most acclaimed racial scientist of his day,4
professor Otmar Freiherr von Verschuer. Verschuer was a
strong supporter of Hitler; his goal was to somehow unlock the
secrets of genetic engineering and find a way to create the
Germanic super-race. It was under this man that the
26 year old Mengele learned that it was tolerable to experiment
on human beings if it was for the good of science. It wasnt
long before Mengele looked up to Verschuer, whom he was attracted
to as the fatherly figure he never had. 5

Strongly
influenced by the professor, Mengele joined the Nazi Party and
immediately applied for the highest group of the society, the SS
(Schutzstaffel). This was a protection squad that controlled
Germanys racial purity and strictly followed Nazi beliefs.
When WWII began two years later, Mengele was drafted and served
as a soldier. Besides just fighting on the battlefield, he was
able to practice medicine and make swift decisions as to which of
the sick would not be treated due to lack of time and medical
supplies. Mengele was awarded many medals during his service
including the First Class, Second Class, and two Iron Crosses,
for bravery and courage. Later, wounded on the battlefield,
Mengele was sent back to Berlin to do deskwork, far from where he
yearned to be: inside a laboratory. 6

Meanwhile,
rumors were spreading that exciting researches were taking place
in some of the concentration camps set up for the Final Solution
(the plan to kill all the Jews of Europe). There were Nazi
doctors who infected captives with virus in hope to treat them
with serums. The widest range of medical possibilities were given
at the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland. With the help of
his mentor Verschuer, Mengele found a spot as an SS doctor at the
largest concentration camp in Germany: Auschwitz; where ten
thousand prisoners arrive each day.

Dr. Mengeles
life was consumed by Auschwitz. He was the Lord of life or
death.7 From a few seconds long glare, this man
would determine the future of each soul that arrived at
Auschwitz, a process called Selektionen. Always neatly dressed in
a perfectly made SS uniform, white gloves, and a soldiers
cap, Mengele would say, links oder rechts,
to every starved person who made the horrendous cattle
stock journey to Auschwitz; to the left meant the gas
chamber, and to the right was the entrance to the heinous labor
camp.

Taking
advantage of all these useless people and keeping his
goal of unlocking the secrets of genetic engineering in mind,
Mengele had many interests in those who were genetically unusual.
Among his passions for people with abnormalities and different
eye colors, Dr. Mengele gleamed with happiness as he laid eyes on
twins. Twins, twins, out! SS soldiers would yell,
pointing at twins to step out of selection lines. Mengele was
especially interested in twins because he believed he could
unlock the secrets to perfect multiple births while also being
able to conduct experiments with a perfect control.

All
of the lucky selected victims were placed in special
barracks that was called the Zoo. These children were spared from
certain abuses such as beatings and punishments and selections,
merely to keep them healthy for experimenting. They were allowed
to keep their hair and clothes, unlike the rest, labeling them as
Mengeles Children. 8 They were also
provided extra rations of food and milk. Every so often, Mengele
would treat his children with candy and clothes, but
only to deceive them to their gruesome end. And to these naive
kids, he became known as Uncle Mengele.

The
line between science and quackery was not a very fine one at
Auschwitz. Mengeles experiments, although ostensibly
performed in the name of scientific truth, followed few
scientific principles.9 Blood samples from twins
were drawn daily and sent to Professor von Verschuer for a grant
to study specific proteins. Many children, especially
the youngest ones, suffered greatly. Those whose arms and hands
were too small had blood taken from their necks; a both very
painful and dangerous procedure. Mengele often traded blood
samples between twins of different blood types. Organ switching
between sets of twins was also popular, as well as deliberate
infection and poisoning to one twin while keeping the other
healthy. Mengele believed with all his heart that if he could
only perform enough experiments, he could be known as the
greatest scientist who ever lived. In addition to these
experiments, Mengele was also noted to perform sex change
operations and incestuous impregnations. Sadly, no one will ever
know for sure what he tried to prove.

Wanting
to create a perfect Aryan race with blue eyes and blond hair, eye
studies and hair color were also important to Mengele. He and his
assistants would insert different chemicals such as ethylene blue
in the eyes to see if the natural shade of the iris would change.
This was done sometimes by eye drop, other times by needle, often
leaving twins blinded; one was even noted to have died. And if
these lab rats didnt already suffer and die
from the vicious testing, they were killed either by chloroform
injected into their hearts or by gas. But still, these children
couldnt rest in peace. They were cut up like pork with
their eyes gouged out and their bodies probed. Whatever way one
looks at it, the death of the children was always the secret
intention of Mengele.

When
the Doctor came across victims with physical abnormalities, they
were immediately shot and their bodies taken into Mengeles
lab and later sent off to Verschuer for more studies. Mengele
believed that he and the Nazi organization were doing what was
right for the German people. It was necessary for the good of the
Aryan Race. Other unthinkable experiments the Doctor conducted on
frail bodies included the following: the castration of men and
boys without anesthetics, inflicting women with high-voltage
shocks to test their endurance, and sterilizing girls with x-ray
machines until they ended up with painful burns.

In
addition to the many activities he conducted, Mengele was also
known for having rows of women standing nude in front of him to
answer sexual questions. This, of course, supposedly allowed him
to see if the women were fit to live or not. But it was evident
that he lusted after them, though it was forbidden.10 There
was a beautiful fifteen-year-old Jew by the name of Ibi who
Mengele found himself absolutely attracted to during inspection.
11 Becuase he couldnt show his feelings towards Jews,
Ibi was sent to Block 10, where malicious experiments were
performed on her and others, turning them into old shriveled bags
of bones after only a few weeks. 12

Mengele
was astonishing at Auschwitz; he seemed to be here, there, and
everywhere at once. He greeted the new inmates, signed death
certificates, worked on experiments, gassed people, did daily
selections, and yet still had time to play with the kids. It wasnt
until the end of 1944, when the Germans were losing the war that
Mengeles experiments came to a halt. More than 40 pairs of
twins survived the Holocaust and the Doctors evil testings.
On the day of the final roll call on January 17, 1945, Mengele
escaped with all of his medical papers and started a new life in
different places with the help of generous friends. Being charged
with several crimes against humanity (including selections,
lethal injections, beatings, shootings, and other killings),
Mengele was never persecuted as the atrocious and vile mass
murderer he was.

On
June 15th, American troops captured more than ten
thousand German soldiers, including Mengele. However, during
questioning Mengele wasnt identified as an SS member
because he didnt have the official tattoo that all members
were branded with for he didnt want to harm his perfect
Aryan skin. 13 Also, at the time, the Americans had
not received the wanted list of Josef Mengele, therefore werent
able to identify the Doctor.

As
a child, Mengele often boasted that one day his name would appear
in the encyclopedia, and ironically it is, only to be listed as a
surviving symbol of Adolf Hitlers Final Solution,14
marked by unspeakable horrors and unnatural acts. This
untamed monster grew up in a society filled with hatred and high
egos that discriminated against everyone but themselves. The
corrupt society allowed this animal to annihilate hundreds of
innocent people daily and to conduct malevolent tests on poor
victims without the slightest twinge of guilt, all because society,
namely the Germans, approved in the name of science. But in
reality, all Mengele was really doing was exercising his power,
never for real scientific research. Mengele did what he was told;
to uphold the Nazi Supremacy.